Category Archives: Society

The Dunkley Pramotor allowed mother’s and nannies to effortlessly take baby on a trip around town without getting warn out

Built by British motor firm, Dunkley, in Birmingham, the Dunkley Pramotor was the company’s fourth attempt at a useful automobile to meet unmet needs.

Launched in 1923, the one-wheeled power pack was designed to be a practical mother’s helper, but in reality the bizarre machine earned Dunkley immortality.

The mother, or more often the nanny, would stand astride the single wheel of the scooter having attached it to the back of the pram.

The early machines were kick started, meaning nanny had to jump on with zeal and hope for the best.

They were originally designed with one horsepower, horizontal, single-cylinder two-strokes.

Initially, there was only one gear and once kick started, the noisy machine’s hectic progress was controlled with twin handlebars bolted to the back of the pram, with a hand-controlled clutch.

From the ‘inventor’s notebook’ it appears they intended the device to enable mothers to seem as though they could effortlessly glide behind the pram

Throwing caution to the wind, Dunkley introduced in 1924 the two-speed series.

Had there been such considerations as health and safety at the time, perhaps speeding along the road, baby-first in a non-crumple proof, open top vehicle, without any kind of restraint, may not have been permitted.

But thanks to the early freedoms to innovate potentially dangerous contraptions at will, people paid anything between 40 to 135 guineas for the Dunkley Model 20 Pramotor and the Saloon Pramotor with 26 x 2 in Palmer Cord motor tyres, respectively.

One of Dunkley’s earlier models was a ‘Patent Self-charging Gas Motor Car’, pictured, which took its supply of gas from any ordinary gas pipe or street lamp post, as shown to the right

For sporting nannies there was the option of this space-age looking 21 horsepower engine – a 750 cc two-stroke single – which at 75 guineas promised performance far beyond the roadholding capabilities of the average perambulator

Neither Ace Young nor Diana DeGarmo won their respective seasons ofAmerican Idol, but they pretty much stole the show on Wednesday’s season 11 finale. Before Phillip Phillips was announced as the winner (besting Jessica Sanchez), host Ryan Seacrest invited season five contestant Young, 31, and season three runner-up DeGarmo, 24, onstage.

Once the lights were dimmed, Young said, “This has always been home to us and I felt that this would be the perfect place to ask a simple question.”

“We have conquered Broadway together. We have created our new music together. We have an amazing group of people around us. And with the help of David Webb jewelry I have a way to make this last forever. Are you ready?”

As DeGarmo looked tearful and flabbergasted, he gushed, “I love you to death. You’re my best friend. I want to make this last forever and I will do anything in my power to have the most … amazing life together if you will have me. Diana Nicole DeGarmo, will you marry me?”

Artist Alison Jackson has reimagined the impending nuptials of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie where the roles of the couple are played by actors

No, things are not quite as they appear.

What seems, at first glace, to be the ultimate paparazzi scoop, is actually an elaborate set-up by maverick artist Alison Jackson.

Jackson is known for her reimaginings of iconic events in which actors play the leading roles.

Last minute preening and preparations away from prying eyes. Or so they think…

Her most notable coup to date was perhaps a 300-image spoof take on the wedding of Prince William and The Duchess of Cambridge.

And now the artist has turned her camera on the impending marriage of Hollywood couple, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie.

The bride looks ravishing in ivory – ‘is it Armani Prive or is it vintage’ – we find ourselves wondering as Jackson’s lens follows her lookalikes from their hotel suite to the car to the outdoor ceremony itself.

One thing is for sure though. As any magazine deal surrounding the real photographs is likely to be worth about $10 million, security to protect the actual proceedings will be rather tighter than it is in Jackson’s world…

Everything’s perfect and Brad and Angelina are all dressed and ready for the serious business of marriage

Hollywood’s royal couple emerge from behind the door of their hotel suite – but the sunglasses aren’t fooling anyon

A stolen moment captured in the car. What sweet nothings is Brad whispering in Angelina’s ear?

The couple emerge from their vehicle with serious expressions

As the official wedding photographer snaps away, the couple appear unaware that they are being watched from above

And when curly-haired Facebook founder Zuckerberg turned up to promote the social network site’s shares flotation in a black-hooded top, jeans and trainers, billionaire investors looked on in astonishment.

Wall Street just about got used to the finance whizzkids of the 1980s wearing red braces yet nothing could have prepared them for this.

But usual rules do not apply when you’re one of the world’s youngest chief executives, whose company will float on the stock exchange for the first time this Friday with a valuation of £62billion.

That makes it worth more than McDonald’s or Goldman Sachs, although investors still weren’t impressed with how he dressed.

One top stockmarket analyst said: “I think that’s a mark of immaturity.”

Zuckerberg, who turned 28 on Monday, was also voted one of the world’s worst-dressed men by magazine GQ.

Laptop lapdog: On the computer with his pet

But there is method in his fashion madness – his trademark hoodie is in fact a piece of Facebook merchandise and displays in grey the three logos for “friend requests”, “messages” and “notifications”.

It’s not just his dress sense which is seen as slightly out of the ordinary, though.

He carries two business cards, one simply stating his lofty position as company “CEO” but another, for less formal occasions, which reads “I’m CEO…b*tch!”

At work at Facebook HQ in Menlo Park, California, Zuckerberg has no office and instead holds court among accountants, engineers and internet gurus at a messy desk in the middle of the huge room.

But he also rubs shoulders with America’s rich and famous, including President Obama, pop star Katy Perry and rapper Snoop Dogg.

And on one wacky day, a grey-haired man burst into the HQ surrounded by an entourage.

He was the oldest in the room by 20 years and the only one wearing a suit.

Marching up to Zuckerberg he introduced himself as Robert Mueller, director of the FBI.

Scruffy: With girlfriend Priscilla Chan

They shook hands and chatted about nothing for a couple of minutes and then Mueller promptly left.

One worker said: “There was a giddy silence while everybody just looked at one another as if to say, ‘What the hell just happened?’”

Welcome to the weird and wonderful world of internet entrepreneur Zuckerberg, who has almost single-handedly destroyed the productivity of workplaces around the world.

Yet he has a powerful work ethic.

When Facebook was in its early days, he and his co-founders and their small team worked relentlessly on the new project.

One employee remembers him refusing to let others out for a bite to eat, crying: “‘No! We’re in lockdown! No one leaves until we’re done with this thing.”

But when the tight group partied, they did it hard.

A zip wire was even fixed from a chimney to the ground so partygoers could drop into the pool from above.

Upload pic: With Snoop Dogg and entrepreneur Sean Parker

And the landlord had to send a letter of complaint asking him not to throw furniture into the pool or walk on the roof.

Annoyed at the treatment of a pal by a venture capital firm looking to invest in Facebook, Zuckerberg turned up at a meeting in his pyjamas, with a PowerPoint computer presentation listing the top 10 reasons they shouldn’t invest.

He is devoted to his Chinese-American girlfriend Priscilla Chan and in 2011 spent Christmas with her riding a buffalo in Vietnam.

It is one of the few country’s in the world to block his social network site – and he then posted pictures of it on his own Facebook page.

The couple have been dating since their college days at Harvard, after meeting at a party while waiting in a toilet queue. Priscilla later said she thought

Zuckerberg was “this nerdy guy who was just a little bit out there”.

But despite all his bizarre quirks and oddities, he is already worth a staggering £10billion.

And he is in charge of a company which has connected 900 million people – almost one seventh of the Earth’s population – through a simple idea conceived in a dormitory of Harvard University.

But it was only last May he treated himself to a £7million five-bedroom house in Palo Alto, California, a handy 10- minute commute to the office.

Poke: Katy Perry points the way on a visit to Facebook

Until then, despite his enormous wealth, the computer genius had been living in a relatively modest two-storey house on a street neighbours described as “absolutely average”.

No Ferrari, Porsche or Bugatti Veyron for him. Instead he went for a basic Nissan Infiniti, and nicknamed it The Warthog.

Tyler Winklevoss, one half of the Harvard and Oxford rowing twins who successfully sued Zuckerberg for millions claiming he stole the idea for Facebook from them, once said: “He’s the poorest rich person I’ve ever seen in my life.”

Each year, though, he sets himself a new challenge.

Bizarre as it may seem, given the way he turned up on Wall Street this week, in 2009 he decided to wear a tie for a year.

For 2010, he announced he’d be learning Chinese. “Some members of my girlfriend’s family only speak Chinese and I wanted to be able to talk to them,” he said.

“I blocked out an hour every day to study and it has been an amazing experience so far.”

In January, 2011, he wrote on his own Facebook page “Became a vegetarian”, writing that he only want to, “eat meat if I kill the animal myself.

“The reason for this is that I feel lucky for having such a great life”.

New home: He’s finally upgraded from his former modest house

Zuckerberg, who owns a dog called Beast, wanted to feel more “connected” to the food he eats and the “animals that give their lives so I can eat them”.

The statement was “liked” by 25,168 of his 13 million Facebook page followers, and every wall post he writes gets around 300 comments.

The famously frugal tycoon has since killed chickens, a pig and a goat as part of his personal crusade for more responsible eating.

He said his first kill was a lobster, which he had to throw into a pot of boiling water.

Now he is telling friends he is interested in trying hunting.

A chef who showed Zuckerberg how to kill animals in the most humane way said: “He cut the throat of the goat with a knife, which is the most kind way to do it.”

Having slaughtered the animals, they are sent to a butcher, who then cuts them into parts and returns them to Zuckerberg and Priscilla to cook and eat.

For one recent meal, he reportedly ate a chicken, including the heart and liver, and used the feet to make a stock.

A photo of the chicken and the dishes he made from it were put on Facebook.

But for all his eccentricity, he’s definitely a trend setter.

In his honour, Australian fashion firm Betabrand has just released an “executive pinstripe hoodie” nicknamed The Zuck.

“The Music of the Spheres” builds on the mathematical theme of the previous episode. Jake has been using his new tablet to make musical notes with numbers. Martin is hopeful that the next step might be for him to make words with numbers, and tries to show Jake an app that would let him do so, but Jake is not interested. Telling Sherry he’s taking Jake out for a day in Central Park, Martin calls Clea and tells her to get a head start on sorting through Teller’s research- he and Jake will meet her there. Having been taken off the case, Clea is free to go rogue. Naughty children, you two!

On the way, Jake bumps into a woman (and as we have learned, people don’t bump into each other on this show without a reason) who spills her coffee on them both. Everyone leaves to get a change of clothes. When the woman goes upstairs to the music shop she owns to get a new shirt, she inadvertently interrupts a robbery by an unlikely suspect: a 13 year-old boy. The child pulls a gun on her but flees.

At home changing, Martin tries to press the app on Jake again. Instead, Jake pulls out the gun, which he somehow picked up from the alleyway through which the Robber Boy fled. Martin is not pleased. He makes Jake take him back to the alley, where they find the kid. Martin confronts him, and he fires back, asking what’s “the matter” with Jake. “My son uses numbers to talk,” Martin says. This strikes a chord: “My brother doesn’t talk either. Maybe he could show my brother how to talk with numbers?” the kid asks. Before we know it, they’re all en route back to his house.

Meanwhile, Clea is busy getting the inside scoop about Teller from his former roommate Abram, who also appears to be a researcher. He claims they were best friends, but Abram is jarringly nonchalant about Teller’s death. Martin calls to explain that they have wound up in the Bronx with two kids named Elliot (Robber Boy) and Andre (his disabled older brother) who seem to be completely on their own. After she hangs up, Abram shows her a picture of Amelia (the Amelia of the Amelia Sequence). Clea recognizes the little blonde girl in the photo from the facility! Teller was working with her, Abram explains, but, under pressure to produce results, pushed her too hard and caused some sort of setback. He lost his tenure and blamed himself for hurting Amelia, which sent him into a deep depression.

To temper all the grimness with a little music, we are introduced to Felipe, a mop-haired guitar player in Portugal or Brazil (global locations are anyone’s guess on Touch). He’s singing to Yarah, a classy café-owner. He asks her to run off to the beach with him, and when she demurs he proposes running off to New York instead. The happy times don’t last long: a man arrives who is trying to buy the café, causing Yarah to admit she can no longer pay its mortgage. Still, she’s desperate to hang on to the business: her grandmother built it and after her mother and sister died, it’s all she has left of her family.

OR IS IT? Clea discovers that Elliot and Andre have an aunt who was never contacted when their mother died years ago. Andre and Jake are currently bonding: Jake plays music on his tablet, and Andre uses it to spell out that he’s hungry. It’s a small miracle that we hope Jake will be capable of soon. Elliot tells Martin the story of how he got stuck caring for his older brother all alone: first their mother died, and then their father took off when Andre got shot in the head a year ago, causing permanent brain damage. Just then, Elliot gets a text and abruptly asks them to leave. On their way out, Martin and Jake hear a middle-aged man threatening him about the botched robbery. Martin begs Elliot to let him help. “No one can help me,” the boy sorrowfully replies.

So they finally meet up with Clea, and Abram immediately identifies Jake as “one of the 36” people who are blessed and work to alleviate suffering, “to repair the universe, if you will.” Heavy stuff.

Martin goes to visit Elliot’s probation officer, John Tenney, claiming to be Elliot’s basketball coach. They speak in veiled threats to each other as Martin expresses his concern that someone is harassing Elliot. On his way out, Martin recognizes a guy from the alleyway by the music store. It turns out he and Elliot share the same probation officer. He says he works at the music store, and that he told John about how the owner lets cash pile up in the store throughout the month.

Felipe has resolved to sell his guitar so that he can help Yarah keep her business afloat. His friend tells him about a music shop in New York that will pay “top dollar” for such a fine instrument. It’s the same music store that was almost robbed earlier, and the owner is on her way to the bank with the money that Elliot tried to steal that morning. Elliot intercepts her and gets her purse this time. Martin finds him, crying in the alleyway, as the police arrive.

Felipe gives Yarah all the money he got from selling his guitar and announces that he wants to be her partner. Just as she’s about to decline his offer, she gets a voice message from Martin informing her that she has nephews who need her help. Yarah wisely decides to accept Felipe’s support and money.

Elliot comes back to Tenney with the purse. “What the hell took you so long?” Tenney asks aggressively. Elliot hands over the money and the gun that Tenney gave him. But he’s wearing a wire this time and Tenney is immediately arrested by the police. Phew!

The episode concludes with Felipe and Yarah, who got to New York remarkably quickly, serving a nice dinner to Elliot and Andre. Meanwhile, back at the facility Sherry asks where Jake’s tablet went, and Martin proudly tells her that he gave it away. “How could you do that? He could have used it to talk!” Sherry demands. “Maybe he doesn’t want to talk,” Martin realizes. “Maybe it’s my job as his father to be okay with that.”

Connections forged:
Jake and Andre, Martin and Elliott, Felipe and Yarah, Yarah and her long-lost nephews, Tenney and comeuppance.

CBS wasn’t bluffing … ’cause the network has made good on its threat to sue ABC over an upcoming reality show which CBS claims is a blatant rip off of “Big Brother” … and it’s NASTY.

As we previously reported, CBS fired off a cease-and-desist letter to ABC last week … claiming “Glass House” is “strikingly” similar to “Big Brother” — a bunch of people living in a house and competing for prizes.

Now, in a lawsuit filed in federal court in L.A., CBS states, “If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then CBS should take pride in ABC’s latest reality television project, ‘Life in a Glass House.'”

In the suit, CBS refers to “Glass House” as a “carbon copy” of “Big Brother” — and calls ABC’s decision to green light the show an “obvious attempt … to capitalize on its unique success.”

CBS claims its trying to stop ABC from committing a blatant theft of its copyrightable expression, trade secrets and other confidential information.

CBS also claims ABC has hired at least 19 former “BB” staffers to work on “Glass House” — and believes the employees are actively disclosing CBS’s trade secrets and confidential information to produce the show. CBS also believes at least one “Glass House” exec has been trying to poach current “BB” employees.

CBS wants at least 3 former high level “Big Brother” employees who signed with “Glass House” to fork over $500,000 EACH for allegedly violating a confidentiality agreement they had with CBS.